June 13, 2013

We are at the SB on Ramp from SE Marine Drive to Knight Street Bridge (apriori into Vancouver juridiction), the location is 7800 Knight bridge street according to VPD tickets issued right there…But who should get a ticket?

Who should get a ticket? the cyclist or the sign owner, Mainroad (their trailer license plate read 9552 3Y)?

According to the Vancouver Police Department, the ticket issued will look like below:

$29 Helmet fine on Knight street bridge issued on March 4, 2013 (some fields masked to preserve privacy of both the offender and police officer)

Nota: It was no movable sign, at the time the ticket was issued, but a police cruiser was parked exactly the same way. The cops, far to be ashamed to block the bike lane, were explaining it was dangerous to ride on the roadway without an helmet. No argument is necessary in such case…

May 28, 2013

According to many maps, there is a separated bike lane able to make your trip safer, shielded from street-racer (Knight street is a favorite spot for that), armada of container trucks barreling down Knight street and other intimidating traffic. Here we go:

If you bike can fit into the bike lane, you will have to find your way among debris and other waste, courtesy of Richmond city

The bike lane, not much wider than a bike handle bar, is supposed to be bi-directional, and shared with pedestrian:

Entering or exiting the bike lane, can be challenging:

It is hard to get on the mandatory cycle track

The bike lane is mandatory, says the sign, posted 350 meter after the beginning of the concrete barrier (in black on map): Does cyclists are really expected to jump onto the barrier?

Some cyclists will prefer to use the roadway, but most will try to use the bike lane:

The concrete barriers start at Richmond Bridgeport interchange: to be on the right side of it, suppose to cycle on the Richmond sidewalk: that is illegal!

beside jumping onto the concrete barrier, the only other option is to ride illegally the Bridegport sidewalk in Richmond

The later option is the one usually preferred by the cyclists, what tends to irate pedestrians and transit riders waiting their bus there:

The Bridegport sidewalk is narrow, and has bus stops

Exiting of it, is also a bit of challenge in itself too:

East side bike lane, merging to Knight Street in Vancouver: Welcome to the real world (the most dangerous intersection in Canada say the medias)!- Where the handrail stands is the entrance of a trail joining 64th avenue: cyclists are discouraged to use it.

Did you know that bike are not allowed in bus lane in BC? following the sign is both illegal (breaking solid lines) and pretty unsafe on this exit ramp.

Riding along the bike lane is not a breeze either:

Most cyclists fail to dismount their bike and disobey the law regarding using crosswalk (BC MVA 183.2.b ) at ramp crossing, but they still tend to stop for obvious reasons:

narrow entrance at ramp crossing, with bumper, or kerb, are the rule on Knight Bridge

That makes the ride much more cumbersome, and not any safer: gaining momentum from a standing position, require lot of energy, and attention, which is then not focused on traffic as the cyclist in the above picture illustrates.

Better practice from Lyon, France:

The example below is at the Bd Irene Joliot Curie and Bd Pheripherique Laurent Bonnevay intersection (redone when the tramway T4 has been built):

Cyclist are not required to stop, at each crossing, even less to dismount, what allows them to spend less time in hazardous zone, and still proceed safely:

Normal people will obviously give up in face of all those inconvenience (did I mention, the snow and ice on the uncleared bike path in winter?), and the “bike to work” week, will be just that: a week! It is too bad, since it is a bottleneck which deserve much greater attention that it has, and both cycling and transit can go a long way to increase the capacity of Knight Bridge to move people

Nevertheless one can still see either

hardcore cyclists, all renegade breaking the law in one way or another, as seen above, and admittedly, it is the only way to cycle decently on Knight bridge

or eventually lost cyclists on the bridge (also breaking the law), may be mislead by some cycling maps, presenting the Knight bridge cycle tracks are the same as the Stanley park bike path!

Cyclist, beware, don’t trust the cycling maps!

Cyclist could be seen may be also because, taking the bus here is even a worse experience:

The arduous trail to the Mitchell island bus stop SB: muddy in winter, dusty in summer, slippy all the time!

February 13, 2012

As you probably know, The Translink commission is inviting comments from the public on the proposed fare increase, and particularly on TransLink’s efficiency (The deadline for sending them is February 15, 2012). This post is part of my contribution toward it, and I encourage you to share yours too.

optimize the network by pruning irrelevant, because redundant and lightly used, route segments

Translink has published a Transit plan for Vancouver in 2005 [1]. While many recommendations of it have been implemented, especially the good integration of the bus system with the Canada line, some others aiming at making the system more efficient have not been followed so far:

short turning of the route 3 (Main) at Main and hasting

short turning of alternate trip of route 20 (Victoria) at Commercial and Powell (instead to go thru Downtown)

The saving can be very dramatic, and in the case of route #3, it could have allowed a 30% reduction of the bus fleet.

One of the reason for that is expressed by the average speed diagram below.

Average operating speed of Transit(2)

Due to relatively low operating speed on the Hasting and Downtown segment, the buses tend to spend a considerable amount of time there. Below is an estimate of it (from 2010 Translink timetable)-and a recent reduction of posted speed on Hasting makes the matter only worse:

route

number of runs

fleet requirement

total service hour

hr on hasting/Downtown

% of service hr on Hasting/Downtown

3

280

14

197

41

21%

8

317

16

196

34

17%

20

332

20

250

75

30%

This fact makes also for a low reliability route. The additional observation that most customers transfer to/from SkyTrain for downtown access and ridership in downtown and Hasting is pretty light-an observation corroborated by Translink ridership analysis [1]– complete the justification of the short turning of those routes South of Hasting (instead to head toward downtown).

Those route could then operate on a nearly pure grid system- Hasting street being served by route 14,16 and 135 among others on nearby parallel corridors. The lack of direct service to downtown is largely compensated by the Skytrain access: In that matter, those routes could not be treated more differently than the suburban bus routes (which have been short-turned with the advent of the canda line for similar reasons). Furthermore It is also worth to note the route 19 still ensures a direct connection between downtown and Main, north of Broadway.

Since we are talking of frequent route operated by 60 foot trolleybuses, the saving can be massive, not only in operating hours but also in bus fleet requirement, which can be also reduced significantly. Part of it can be redeployed to improve the network connectivity, on a model as below:

Toward a Vancouver network better connected to the South of Fraser one

The main idea, is to connect as much as possible Vancouver N/S bus routes at either Marine Drive or Knight bridge:

This Hub allows connection with the Richmond network -route 405,407 and 430- [3], which legitimates the extension of route 8 and 20 toward it. Since there is no bus loop, and the number of runs on route 8 and 20 are roughly equivalent, the buses of route 8 could continue on route 20 in the same manner as buses operates on route 5/6.

Notice that the bus queue jumper on Knight bridge provide a natural advantage to the Richmond’s bus which could be more leveraged by providing a decent scope of connection on the Vancouver side from this Bridge

The Harison loop (bus 20), is then retired (and can be sold)

The Marine drive hub

All the runs of route 3 go to Marine drive: This is to encourage contra-flow riding, hence lowering the pressure on main flow

Observing that very few customers stay on the bus at Marine drive, route 100 is replaced by route 16 West of marine drive. Both route have similar number of runs, so it is roughly equivalent in term of operating cost but

It increases the number of destination accessible from Marine Drive

It replaces a diesel bus by a trolley can’t be bad!

It allows to retire the route 16 bus loop-as well as Marpole loop-which can be sold (what can probably pay all the work required for other operation suggested in this post).

Summary

The short turning of the routes at Hasting largely pays for the extension of all the 3,8 and 20 bus runs at either Knight bridge or Marine Drive:

route

number of run

cur fleet requirement

cur total service hour

proposed total service hour

proposal bus requirement

% hr saved

3

280

14

197

161

12

13.5%

8

317

16

196

178

15

9%

20

332

20

250

186

16

25%

While, the proposal improves significantly the connectivity of the network, the average daily operating hour saving-120hrs- could be still around 18% , what is probably worth $5 millions/years (assuming operating cost of $120 per vehicle.hr), leaving significant room to improve other part of the system.

It could be interesting to understand why Translink has chosen to not implement its own efficiency recommendation as stated in [1], but it occurs that it could be a good time to proceed forward on it

September 2, 2011

The Richmond picture

Thought number date of 2000, there are still good enough to illustrate the market potential for Transit in Richmond. a city characterized by a high ratio job/population source. (1)

Translink, had drafted a transit area plan in 2000 for Richmond [1] and most of the ideas proposed in this plan have been implemented in the subsequent years. As mentioned in a previous post, the advent of the Canada line has left relatively untouched the local transit network in Richmond, even when some route, touted as express, like the 430 are now slower than other options using the Canada line. The short cutting of the 480 (terminus at Bridgeport instead of Brighouse) is the only noticeable exception.

here after is some proposed improvements, which are budget neutral from a revenue operating hours perspective

A suggested new bus network for Richmond

To summarize

401: no change

402, ~90 runs are extended to Knight Bridge: that is a 50% service improvement on the 407

It allows a service every 30mn, instead of every hour midday, which more than compensate the lost of route 430. the route 402 is preferred to route 407, because it doesn’t need to make a detour to serve Brighouse

403 terminate at Steveston instead of Riverport

That is part of a terminus swapping with route 407. It also apriori allows 403 to travel denser part of Steveston Hwy, making better usage of its high frequency along this corridor.

407, Terminate at Landsowne instead of Knight Bridge and start at Steveston instead of Riverport

The route followed by 407 along Westminster Hwy allows it to connect with all other local routes, as well as route 301,411 so it doesn’t need to loop at Brighouse. We then prefer Landsowne since it increases the transit covered area.

410, Along Railway to Moncton, instead of Garypoint

C92, no change

C93, no change

C94, no change

C96, Knight Bridge, Number 5, Cambie East, Number 6, Brighouse

So doing, the route C96 can offer a quick access to Number 6 road from Brighouse (10mn instead, of 23mn by the 410 or current C96) and able to contribute to relieve more efficiently the 410 (in association with the redesigned route 301 and 411).

Some general principle leading the change

Local Hub vs Regional Hub

Most, if not all, of the Local Bus routes should be connected to a regional hub

Richmond presents some challenges since we have to compose with a

An international hub, the airport

A regional hub, Bridgeport

A local hub, Brighouse

To ensure a good connectivity between the regional and local hub, you would like merge the both, but that is also done at the expense of a good local inter-connectivity which occur in the center of Richmond. That said, a good connectivity of the local network with the regional one can be achieved by capitalizing on secondary hubs:

Riverside hub

A good connectivity of the local network with the regional one can be achieved by connecting as much as possible local route with the Hwy99 bus stop at Steveston: that is Riverside, a new hub Richmond has to capitalize on. It motivates the connection of route 401,404,405 407 and C93 to this hub

Notice that the current Steveston interchange design doesn’t allow the buses to U turn. The loop at RiverPort costs 4mn returns, which can amount to a significant expense (30hrs if all the route named terminate at RiverPort instead of Riverside) so some roadwork improvements could be required here.

Knight bridge hub

At this time, it connects Richmond with Vancouver routes 22 and 100. The connectivity could be much better by extending Fraser route 8 and Victoria route 20 to Knight Bridge, but that involves numerous challenge, so at this time it is a secondary hub in waiting to be developed.

A Grid oriented network
For each major axis, one bus route.

Cambie is mainly serviced by route 410, but a significant portion of the corridor is also cuurently serviced by routes 405 and C96

While Route 405 connects Cambie with Knight Bridge, we can consider it is not the most efficient way to provide the connection due to the high level of redundancy between route 405 and 410 on Cambie, both going to Brighouse. The idea is to suppress the route 405 north of Brighouse – that translate in a saving estimated at 31hrs. The redesigned routes 301 and 411 addresses potential crowding problem on current route 410. A revamped C96 addresses the connectivity issue between the Cambie area, and more generally North Richmond and Knight Bridge.

Railway is mainly serviced by route 410…but not south of Williams where it is then by the C93

South of Williams, route 410 made a detour to service the residences at Garypoint. One has to consider that the cost of this detour by the very frequent route 410 has become prohibitive in regard of the served market. Also, so doing, the route 410 avoids the recently developed and now much more populous area along Moncton street, between Railway and route Number 1. That is the reason why we prefer to keep The route 410 along Railway down to Moncton- that translates in a saving of 7hrs. A slightly less frequent bus, 403, can still serve Garypoint.

Garden city (North of Westminster Hwy) is mainly serviced by the bus 407.

The useless detour to the disused Sexsmith Park&Ride is suppressed, the corridor is then serviced by route 402 for reasons previously stated

Bridgeport mainly serviced by the bus 407

The service on this corridor is pretty poor, with a bus 407 per hour most of the day, this in despite of an high job density along a corridor anchored by Bridgeport station. This corridor is serviced by route 402 for reasons previously stated. the detour along Vulcan becomes the main route, this to allow a connection with the route 630 (Ladner-Metrotown).

Westminster Hwy mainly serviced by “no” bus East of Number 3

That is kind of odd, since it is a main axis in Richmond. It becomes serviced by route 405 and 407.

Steveston Hwy

Today, it is partially serviced. East West travel along it is not really possible due to a “missing link” between number 3 and Gilbert. C93 along Williams provides the East-West connector in South Richmond. A swapping of terminus, between routes 403 and 407, provides a Transit continuity for people traveling along Steveston Hwy, and could call for a reduction of the C93 service if necessary, if not the complete discontinuing of this route. The swapping makes the route 407 a bit longer (+1mn per run), but the route 403 a bit shorter (-1mn per run): because the route 407 is less frequent that the route 403, it results in a total net operating saving.

Connecting the local and regional Center of Interest

The Airport

It is one of the major weakness of the current local network: Richmonites can’t easily access the airport, a major source of employment for locals. To correct it, some runs of the route 404 are extended to the airport. One could have considered extending route 301 or 411 could have been more judicious since airport is also a regional destination, but here the route addresses also a local market (Bukerville access).

The Hospital

It is best serviced by route 407, this route hence is redesigned to serve primarily high density residential area, and so, loop in Richmond downtown to connect. Other route like 401 and an extended route 404 provide also good service to the hospital

North Richmond businesses park (Crestwood)

They are not well connected to Bridgeport, either the service is very poor like on Bridgeport, or requires 2 transfer from Bridgeport to access the Cambie corridor, which is oddly enough almost better connected to Knight bridge. Especially for the Bridgeport corridor, there is an untapped customer pool, which can be enticed by a better service, that is a bus route every 30mn all the day at minimum along Bridgeport

The suppression of Cambie with a direct connection to Knight Bridge (405), is compensated by a revamped route C96 which service is increased to match the one of the current 405 – that supposes the adding of 8:30 hours service. We estimate that the high frequency of the route 410 along Cambie make the transfer less painfull here than elsewhere

At the end, a better servicing of North Richmond motivates a rerouting of the 301 on Westminster Hwy (instead of Alderbridge)- this because it uses the exit of Hwy 91 at road number 6 (3mn per run, or 3hrs per day)- in order to connect it with local route C96 and 410. (proposed bus 411 follow same route)

Steveston

This area is very well connected to Brighouse, with a bus every 2-3mn in peak hours, but does this high level of service is visible to the transit rider?

Nope… and that illustrates the problem already raised with the 699B: it is more often a lack of visibility of the level of service that a lack of service itself people will complain of, and in Steveston it is storytelling:

4 bus routes connect it to Brighouse. That translates in 4 different bus stops in different directions along Chatham: here there is lot of room for improvement. A single bus stop -on the model of Marine Drive loop- is the obvious first step. A better location than Chatham for the bus terminus is the second step…

Modifying a bus network is always gonna to hurt some sensibilities, and the few riders affected by a bus change will always be more vocal than the more numerous new customers. That has been verified by the pruning of route 601 at Bridgeport, but it is not something undo-able.

The Lyon transit agency in France did it this year, and one could argue that the budget neutral network reorganization is something sensible to do in time of fiscal restraint.

It helps the public to accept that not anything can be done and some thought choice need to be done

It helps also to prepare the network for future growth

In the example, above, the efficiency found on some route like 410, are in direct relationship with bus frequency:
The more frequent is the bus route, the more relevant is the route reorganization, but the more complex it becomes since the more customer habit it can hurt, so it is better to be done sooner than later.

August 30, 2011

Richmond local transit routes have seen little change with the advent of he canada Line. The network is essentialy geared toward the commuter traffic from Richmond to Vancouver. Richmond is not thought as a destination in itself in despite of its high level of jobs. As an incidence:

the Business parks along Knight Street remain generally inaccessible by people arriving from the South Fraser community (be by buses 351, 301, 601…)

For a Richomnite, it can be a challenge to get to the airport, involving in most of the case not less than 2 transfers (typically one at Brighouse and one at Bridgeport).

The network could also take a more decisive advantage of the choke points surrounding Lulu Island. The proposition hereafter aims at correcting those issues, and we examine in this post the regional view first.

In addition of the existing service, 301 and 351 (which are slightly altered to take the shortest route), the map below introduces the bus service already discussed in this blog

The rational for it, is that since the advent of the Canada line, it is always faster to board on the Canada line and transfer along the way toward Metrotown, than to use the 430 from Brighouse. So it is reasonable to retire an “express route” which has been made obsolete by recent transit improvement (which is eventually illustrated by a relatively poor ridership). Nevertheless, if the route originate from Ladner, (or Riverside), it can offer a definitive advantage for rider travelling toward Metrotown or Knight street area:

route option

Ladner Exchange -> Metrotown travel time

601+430

20+30mn

630

est. 40mn

The retiring of the 430 pay for the introduction of the 630, and a similar number of run per day can be proposed since, in despite of a longer route, the bus travel at a higher speed

The 630, starts at Ladner park and ride exchange, to connect with local shuttle route here, and proposes the service as an alternative to alleviate traffic queuing at the George massey Tunnel.

The 630 stops at Riverside (Hwy99 at Steveston Hwy), providing a good connection with the South East richmond network (401, 403, 404, 405 and C93), and also at Crestwood, where it offers potential connection with regional route 301 and 411 as well as local route 410, and C96, opening new access for people coming from south of the tunnel.

In Vancouver the route is identic to the one currently followed by the 430

One would like to see the 630 service provided by highway coaches, since the patrons boarding this service are still aiming at a relative long journey.

They come from the thesis of Peter Wightman [5], which is the most complete work I have uncovered on the topic applied on the Vancouver area, but still limited on the Fraser crossing bridges.

toll is applied once the traffic volume exceed the road capacity

Price elasticity demand is assumed at -0.2 peak hours, and -0.25 off peak, That is pricing evaluation has been done in 2006, assuming the transit option of the time, i.e. no Canada line and no transit over Port Mann bridge. Another study suggests a price elasticity demand closer to 0.35, in case of improved transit (i.e. Congestion regulation could be achieved with significant lower toll that those envisioned by [5], and revenue of congestion pricing too)

For information, below are the estimated revenue of congestion pricing, in the case of all bridge crossing the Fraser tolled (this assuming the 2006 situation, and a relatively low elasticity of -0.2 peak, and -0.25 off peak period) according to [5].

Bridge

daily revenue (South dir)

daily revenue (North dir)

George Massey Tunnel

89,600

64,400

Alex Fraser Bridge

126,000

67,200

Pattullo Bridge

35,000

21,000

Port Mann Bridge

271,600

90,300

Total (daily)

765,100

Total Annual

191,275,000

It is worth to note that congestion pricing could apply only when bridge reach capacity. At the exception of the Port Mann bridge West bound, that is an average of only 4 hours per bridge (or put in other way, crossing a bridge could be free 20hours per day),… but still generating close to 200 millions of annual revenue only on the bridge crossing the Fraser river.

it is also worth to notice that under a congestion pricing scheme as proposed by [5], the Port Mann bridge toll could have been lower than the one considered by the province (in green on the map above) most of the time…and the Pattullo bridge needs to be tolled less than 3hrs per day (per direction).

[3] I got hourly distribution only for BC MOT bridge, hourly distribution is estimated for other bridge to provide an idea of level of congestion on them (and eventually pricing level/period). While data Provincial bidge are from 2010, and other bridge from 2006, it has been no noticeable increase in traffic in the interim, what is consistent with a longer trend already exhibited in a gateway program definition report of january 2006

[4] There is a discrepancy with number from the MovingBC report[2] eventually due to the fact, that the authors of this report overlooked the fact that the traffic counter is installed south of the Sea Island exit ramp on the Highway 99 south bound. That explains why there is a traffic increase on that bridge